Church programs for Monday, Jan. 22 will resume their normal schedule at all locations this evening.
Leawood’s Sunday night in-person worship has been moved to 4 pm for Sunday, February 11.
During Lent, we are using short videos to share a daily idea (linked to the gospel of Luke) on how to grow spiritually. Watch today’s video. Click here or on the image below:
Note: We are reading the entire gospel of Luke in the GPS. Some day’s readings are longer than usual. We hope you’ll have an extra cup of coffee, or use your lunch break, and read Luke’s entire story of Jesus.
11 A little later Jesus went to a city called Nain. His disciples and a great crowd traveled with him. 12 As he approached the city gate, a dead man was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow. A large crowd from the city was with her. 13 When he saw her, the Lord had compassion for her and said, “Don’t cry.” 14 He stepped forward and touched the stretcher on which the dead man was being carried. Those carrying him stood still. Jesus said, “Young man, I say to you, get up.” 15 The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.
16 Awestruck, everyone praised God. “A great prophet has appeared among us,” they said. “God has come to help his people.” 17 This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding region.
18 John’s disciples informed him about all these things. John called two of his disciples 19 and sent them to the Lord. They were to ask him, “Are you the one who is coming, or should we look for someone else?”
20 When they reached Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you. He asks, ‘Are you the one who is coming, or should we look for someone else?’”
21 Right then, Jesus healed many of their diseases, illnesses, and evil spirits, and he gave sight to a number of blind people. 22 Then he replied to John’s disciples, “Go, report to John what you have seen and heard. Those who were blind are able to see. Those who were crippled now walk. People with skin diseases are cleansed. Those who were deaf now hear. Those who were dead are raised up. And good news is preached to the poor [Isaiah 35:5-6; 61:1]. 23 Happy is anyone who doesn’t stumble along the way because of me.”
24 After John’s messengers were gone, Jesus spoke to the crowds about John. “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A stalk blowing in the wind? 25 What did you go out to see? A man dressed up in refined clothes? Look, those who dress in fashionable clothes and live in luxury are in royal palaces. 26 What did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. 27 He is the one of whom it’s written: Look, I’m sending my messenger before you, who will prepare your way before you [Malachi 3:1]. 28 I tell you that no greater human being has ever been born than John. Yet whoever is least in God’s kingdom is greater than he.” 29 Everyone who heard this, including the tax collectors, acknowledged God’s justice because they had been baptized by John. 30 But the Pharisees and legal experts rejected God’s will for themselves because they hadn’t been baptized by John.
31 “To what will I compare the people of this generation?” Jesus asked. “What are they like? 32 They are like children sitting in the marketplace calling out to each other, ‘We played the flute for you and you didn’t dance. We sang a funeral song and you didn’t cry.’ 33 John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ 34 Yet the Human One [or Son of Man] came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunk, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ 35 But wisdom is proved to be right by all her descendants.”
“To lose a child is among the most painful of human experiences….[As] the woman Jesus met in Nain…walked with her community in sorrow, Jesus had compassion for her.” * In prison (Luke 3:19-20), brave John the Baptist faced doubt. “Jesus’ reported acts (v. 18) were praiseworthy, but differed from the expected baptizing in fire (Luke 3:16-17).” ** If Jesus was “the one,” as John had said, when would he deal with evil Herod? John sent the question directly to Jesus.
Click here to incorporate music and worship from the COR Worship Collective into your daily practice and devotion.
Lord Jesus, thank you that whether I’m full of thanks like the widow or filled with questions like John, I always find in you the loving person who truly was “the one.” Amen.
Dr. Amy Oden is Professor of Early Church History and Spirituality, teaching at several seminaries. Teaching is her calling, and she looks forward to every day with students. Her latest book (Right Here, Right Now: The Practice of Christian Mindfulness, Abingdon Press, 2017) traces ancient mindfulness practice for Christians today.
How do you imagine Jesus as you read these Luke passages? What do his eyes look like? His hair, his mouth? How does he walk, carry himself?
Use your imagination as you walk through these passages in Luke. Place yourself into the funeral procession with the widow who has lost her son (Luke 7:11-17). Or join John’s disciples in a conversation with Jesus (Luke 7:18-23) or the crowd Jesus challenges (Luke 7:24-35). Use all your senses – see, hear, touch, taste, smell – as you imagine yourself into the story, perhaps walking alongside Jesus or being healed by him. Maybe you imagine yourself as one of John’s disciples or the grieving mother or a curious bystander to the whole scene.
What do you notice from where you stand? Fill in some details: Jesus’ voice as he speaks, children running through the crowd, the day’s weather, maybe wafts of smells in the air. Now play out the story, letting your imagination flow and see what comes alive for you. What do you notice in yourself?
The Word was made flesh in Jesus and the Word can also come alive in us, in our imaginations and in our lives. Our imaginations are an amazing gift from God, like clicking on a hyperlink to another plane of awareness. We can exercise holy imagination to put ourselves into the passage, using all of our senses to experience more fully the Word, Jesus himself.
This is an ancient Christian practice, exercising the imagination to experience the Living Word. I invite you to experiment with holy imagination as you read through Luke this season of Lent.
* Ginger Gaines-Cirelli, “Portrait” note on “Widow from Nain” in The CEB Women’s Bible. Nashville: Common English Bible, 2016, p. 1300.
** HarperCollins Christian Publishing. NIV, Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, eBook: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture (Kindle Locations 232935-232936). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.